If Great Cthulhu devours the Houses of Parliament during, say the State Opening of Parliament, and removes at a stroke all Members of Parliament, all members of the House of Lords, the Privy Council, the Monarch and all the senior Royals...

Who is left in charge?

Tags:

Comments

There would be a demise of the crown and the nearest heir proclaimed by what remains of the privy council (they wouldn't all be in parliament); the civil service would survive and enable the continuance of government; writs would be called for a series of by-elections covering presumably every parliamentary constituency, in effect a new general election; devolved and local administrations would also endure.

If memory serves, the heir to the throne doesn't attend the State Opening. Hence Prince Charles would immediately become King and Head of State. After that it's kinda up to him. Assuming that His Tentacleness had only eaten Parliament, we'd till have a functioning State, just no elected representatives. In other words government would continue, until such time as elections could be called, a new Parliament elected, and and Government formed. If you really want to look into the abyss, read Peter Hennesey's 'The Secret State' (2nd edition) which looks in detail at Whitehall's planning for a major nuclear attack on the UK. Truly the stuff of real nightmares.

You may be right, I was vaguely thinking of some event I walked past once where I unexpectedly saw the whole Royal family going in, but now I think of it, that wasn't the State Opening and ISTR it may have been Westminster abbey...

Although, as with the hostage MP, it might be rash to assume that Cthulhu will confine his activities entirely to the River...

Ooh! There's a book! Thank you! I've never read 'When the Wind Blows' or seen the movie because I don't think I'm up for quite that much heartbreak, but a factual account sounds interesting.

If you are going to have a Once King who actually becomes a Future king, then I feel there is going to need to be a lot of clearance to free up a vacancy. And an enormous number of awkward constitutional and bureaucratic obstacles to deal with.

I'm reminded of Deep Secret, when the entire ruling elite of the Koryfonic Empire is wiped out, and government is being held together by a few very junior officials, while they desperately try to find the Lost Heir who can take over and rescue them from the scary situation.